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In a society with a mindset of no right or wrong we certainly do lose. Only in this society can you justify the ending of an innocent life a matter of choice. Only in this society can a mother strap her 2 children into their car seats and roll the car into the lake and have it not be her fault. Only in this society can a woman drown her children one by one and it not be her fault. Only in this society can a group of people beat another person near death and have it explained away. The more and more the moral decline of this country takes hold, we cease being a society and begin to be a rotting cesspool.

No, you simply ducked the question once again. The question was whether my right to life superseded your right to control your body, where, if I needed a kidney to live and you were a perfect match do I have a right to one of your kidneys? You introduced an interesting premise about taxation but ignored the fact that government could tax you every penny you have but without your kidney I am still dead. I am sure that you understand that the use of a fallacy does not disprove an argument. Also, the whole point of a logical argument is to reduce down to a truism. The only forcing done here is your use of fallacies. If you can introduce a valid premise that disproves what I argue then fine but you have yet to do so. Last, we both agree that you have a right to your kidney based on natural law...that is, the right to control your body is paramount to individual freedom. However, I left open the proposition that religious edict might dictate that you surrender one of your kidney based on the premium to the right to life that religion, Christian in particular, hold.

Once again, it is you who is ducking the question. The exchange started with this:

Originally Posted by Odysseus
You are assuming that all persons, looking at the same situation, would come to the same conclusions based on the same logical thought process. This is one of the fallacies of those who assume that logic must dictate values and conduct. One can logically decide that a baby has no immediate value, and can therefore be disposed of. Logic, unhinged from any values, breeds more than its share of atrocities.

You employed no logic that would apply to the right to life.

Suppose I need a kidney and you are a perfect match. Does my right to life mean I have a right to one of your kidneys or does your right to control your body usurp my right to life?

And exactly why is it you see logic unhinged from an values...do you honestly think logic cannot lead us to common values and respect?

Now, when you raised the issue of needing a kidney, I answered your questions. The fact is that there are those who believe that you have no right to your kidney if someone else needs it to live. They can argue their positions with logic, but unless the basic premises are shared, in this case, that there is a right to your own body, then that argument will eventually devolve into a conflict of values which cannot be overcome by logic. It's just their preferences vs. yours.

Originally Posted by PeterS

So how about it, does Christian theology hold life so dear that you must submit your right to control your body in order to save life?

Beats me. I'm Jewish, and highly lapsed, at that.

Originally Posted by PeterS

Why is that? Suppose we strip away all rational logic and leave ourselves only with the irrational reliance on god for direction. What is the impetus to get us out of the dark ages, if we had been so lucky as to make it that far?

You are creating a straw man argument. To state that logic, by itself, does not necessary lead to a moral outcome, does not automatically mean that we must abandon it to a completely irrational faith. Faith, is not, by itself, irrational, since believers can express logical reasons for their belief. But, when it is irrational, it becomes fanaticism, and is just as destructive as secular logic without values.

Originally Posted by PeterS

For all its strengths irrationalism lacks the ability to change and must be dragged kicking and screaming for any type of progress to be made. Irrationalism and rationalism are two sides of the same coin; they need each other. I would however submit that if you stripped away irrationalism rationalism would still be able to find its way. It is rationalisms ability to question and reason that renders it superior to the irrational, which, once off course has no mechanism, save its eventual destruction, to guide it back...

Rationalism and faith together gave us the Renaissance and the enlightenment. Rationalism alone gave us the gulags. Rationalism alone gives us the means to any end, but the determination of the end is a moral decision, not a logical one.

Originally Posted by PeterS

It isn't a question of whether the court is infallible but whether we have to follow law as they dictate and therefore recognize their authority over law. I certainly don't like Citizens United but it is part of rule of law, thanks to the court, and I therefore have to respect it. This is no different then the courts multiple rulings on the ten commandments for what is permissible and what is not with respect to religious display on public lands. What I don't understand is why the objection to secularism? Don't you, conservatives, understand its importance in keeping a people free? Imagine if we had to follow one theology and couldn’t question, couldn’t choose. Conservatives always speak of freedom, Isn’t it better to act as if you actually want it...

We do want freedom. We just don't think that a small group of judges dictating the rules of our lives based on their whims constitutes freedom. The Constitution is the law of the land, and the Constitution was written in simple, clear language that even a judge should be able to understand. You dislike citizens united, because you believe that corporations should be able to influence elections, but the NY Times is a corporation. Why is it that the Times can endorse a candidate on the OPED page (and omit embarrassing news on the front page) without any issue, but if I were to buy an ad right next to that endorsement and repeated the contents of it, it would be illegal by your logic?

Originally Posted by PeterS

And historical law is irrelevant to millions in this country, a country where, even though a minority, they have the same rights as the majority. Understand?

No, but then, irrational arguments generally leave me cold. A display of a historical document doesn't infringe my rights, and I'm a member of a minority. It doesn't threaten yours, either, but it does offend you, which is not a rational decision, but an emotional one.

Originally Posted by PeterS

Don't be sad for me, I've been married for 29 years and am quite happy as are my two children. I was simply making the point that your statement was only partially true and becoming less true each day. As for this (all that is wrong with society) being the responsibly of liberals...my grandmother was one of the sweetest Christian women that you would ever meet and she floored me one day when we were talking and she said, (to paraphrase): 'You young people are so lucky today. You can divorce someone if you don't love them.' It turned out that my grandmother, who, at the age of 26 was regarded as a spinster by her parents, community, and perticulary church was pressured to marry my grandfather which she finally relented to. My grandfather then proceeded to beat and abused her for all of the 40 plus years they were married until god finally had mercy on her and called the SOB to heaven.

Two things. First, I'm sorry for your Grandmother's horrific experience, but that level of abuse was always grounds for divorce, even back in the 1800s. She did have that option, but chose not to act on it. Second, you're an adult? Seriously? The way that you argue here, I assumed that we were dealing with a college kid.

Originally Posted by PeterS

Now while my grandmothers case may not be typical I doubt it atypical and the flaws that you see now were most certainly there then only masked by a irrationalism that wouldn’t tolerate much needed change. Don’t fault liberalism for acting upon and freeing us from what has always been there.

Your grandmother's experience was highly atypical. Most marriages don't entail 40 years of physical abuse, and the laws back then had remedies, which she either didn't know about, or chose not to take up. It wasn't religion that kept her married, it was her choice, and clearly there may have been rational choices that kept her there (financial security, desire to provide for her children, or maybe she did love him, despite everything). The point is that you are blaming religion for her life, instead of recognizing that she had options that she chose not to take. That's the kind of secular irrationality that we've come to expect from liberals, even as they pride themselves on their rationality.

How is asking a question whining? Truth is, there is no mention of the separation of church and state in our founding documents.

Correct. However it is mentioned in the explanation of a certain rule in one of our founding documents.

Mr. President

To messers Nehemiah Dodge, Ephraim Robbins, & Stephen S. Nelson, a committee of the Danbury Baptist association in the state of Connecticut.

Gentlemen

The affectionate sentiments of esteem and approbation which you are so good as to express towards me, on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association, give me the highest satisfaction. my duties dictate a faithful and zealous pursuit of the interests of my constituents, & in proportion as they are persuaded of my fidelity to those duties, the discharge of them becomes more and more pleasing.

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. [Congress thus inhibited from acts respecting religion, and the Executive authorised only to execute their acts, I have refrained from prescribing even those occasional performances of devotion, practiced indeed by the Executive of another nation as the legal head of its church, but subject here, as religious exercises only to the voluntary regulations and discipline of each respective sect.] Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.

I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & your religious association assurances of my high respect & esteem.

(signed) Thomas Jefferson
Jan.1.1802.

“A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.” – Ayn Rand